Is Bing Really Google’s Biggest Competitor?

In an interview with the Journal’s Alan Murray, Google CEO Eric Schmidt takes some jabs at Apple over its “closed system” and said people might choose to give their information to Google instead of Facebook. But Mr. Schmidt tries to downplay the tensions with Apple and Facebook, saying they’re not competitive threats to the Internet giant. So what’s the biggest threat to Google, according to Mr. Schmidt? Bing, Microsoft’s search engine.

Clearly, Google is trying to develop more of a presence in social networking and in mobile, and its biggest competitors there are Apple and Facebook.

In the mobile market, Google is growing quickly with Android but still lags behind Apple and BlackBerry maker Research In Motion. In July, the month with the most recent data, comScore said Google had about 17% of the smartphone-platform market, compared with 39% for RIM and 24% for Apple. Mr. Schmidt said Apple is “an extreme expression of a closed system, and they’re doing a very good job of it.”